


Impolite Society

by elegantanagram (Lir)



Series: HSWC 2014 Bonus Round Fills [3]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Canon, Black Romance, Competition, Contests, Costume Parties & Masquerades, F/M, POV Third Person, Rivalry, Wordcount: 100-2.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-21
Updated: 2014-05-21
Packaged: 2018-01-25 23:49:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1666973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lir/pseuds/elegantanagram
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"You clean up well," she says when she's drawn all the way near. The mockery doesn't just color her voice, it seeps into every line of her body as she maintains effortless poise, her ease so complete that Slick just wants to hit her. His knuckles would never even make it to her face. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>"You look like someone finally managed to bury you, only to be treated to the horror of their bad seed blossoming into some hellish flower," he shoots back.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>She grins, bright and deadly. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>"Thank you," she says. "I never realized you were a man of such poetry." </i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Impolite Society

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the first bonus round of the 2014 [Homestuck Shipping World Cup.](http://hs-worldcup.dreamwidth.org/) The prompt was "Remember that one disastrous time Derse tried to beat Prospit in having a costume party and Clubs Deuce's suggestion to have a Fiesta (with sombreros, etc...) passed?"
> 
> I needed to bend canon a little to have the Midnight Crew in the same place as a version of the White Queen still regarded as the Queen of Prospit, so this is nominally a modern fantasy AU focusing on the semi-corporate kingdoms of Prospit and Derse and the two races of carapacians that inhabit them. Mostly, this is an AU where Slick is angry as fuck (okay, not so AU) and he and Snowman maybe want to kiss more than they want to kill each other.

-

Slick plucks at the cloth draped around his shoulders, and hisses. 

Standing together, they look like the Midnight Crew decided to go straight, change professions, and form a mariachi band. The colorful poncho covering Slick's shoulders isn't remotely his color, and Droog looks dead set on burning the offensive garment he's been coerced into at the earliest convenience. Oh, it's not obvious on his face, but Slick can tell. Just from the drawn set of Droog's brows, he can tell. 

The over-abundance of orange in the décor violently clashes with the purple of their venue, because this is Derse, and there isn't a single damn entertainment hall on Derse that wouldn't look like it had been puked up on after being hung with their decorations. Deuce is beaming broad enough to split his face, and Slick badly wants to cuff him on it. The little shitstain is so damn pleased with himself, all for getting the horrorterrors-cursed, worst idea for a party extruded out of the clenched and straining anus of Dersite bureaucracy. 

Honestly, Droog should be proud of the little guy for working that system, not glaring subtle daggers at every last Mexican-themed balloon. 

(They'd made Hearts blow those up, what with the pipes on the big guy. Like hell Slick was going to pay for an oxygen tank just to inflate several hundred red, white, and green balloons. Slick hadn't the faintest clue who'd netted them all up against the ceiling, but that wasn't his fucking problem. Unless the ties gave, then he'd probably go shithive maggots and stab every last gently descending, happy sphere.)

Droog checks his watch, and Slick is reminded that this is not, in fact, his private hell.

This is his public hell and in – he looks to the clock suspended over the arched entrance to the hall – less than ten minutes, every gibbering idiot he's never wanted to brush shoulders with will pour in to share it. His hand starts twitching toward the table where the stick for the pinata got set, but Deuce has already chattered at him three times about how that can't be broken until much later, when all the guests will get to play!

Given his druthers, Slick is going to bash his own head in repeatedly with the heavy, ribbon-wrapped staff. 

He can't do that, though. As much of an affront as the entire bullshit party is to every sensibility he'd never even wanted to have, his pride is greater than his shame, and his pride insists that he not lose. They're hosting the yearly Derse-Prospit Diplomatic Costume Party, and like hell was he going to let his side of a universes-wide grudge drop even the merest hair's breadth in those standings. He's going to make damn sure their party is more of a hit than the shindig the Prospitians threw last year, even if he has to spike every last bowl of punch and inject substances into every festering, diminutive taquito by himself. 

Slick never wanted to face the white queen in a moldering poncho, but he's going to suck it up, buckle down, and do it, because her good opinion will come from his disgusting farce of manners, not his laughable, costumed looks. They're still three minutes till showtime, but Slick hears the unmistakeable sound of heels against tile. He spins around to chew out the degenerate who thought it was a good idea to sneak into the party early, and whatever short, harsh words he'd had at the tip of his tongue die unvoiced on his lips. 

He'd entirely forgotten that Snowman might deign to make an appearance. 

She's decked out in full skirts nearly as broad in their sweep as she is tall, which is saying a hell of a lot, with the full head she has over Slick. It's like she's been stuck feet-first into an elaborately frosted cupcake, the dress blossoming like the world's most glorified, overpriced confectionery. It's a quinceanera dress, which he grudgingly supposes is appropriate for the theme, even if she's way too damn old to be wearing it. He's sure as hell not going to tell her that, though – with the fabric dyed the precise, vibrant red of blood, no one would even see the stain if she stuck him in the ribs. 

She swans across the room like she's lord of the place (like he supposes she was, once upon a time, but Snowman is queen no longer), though there's an unsettling pucker pulling at her lips. Slick wants to yank off his sombrero and stomp on it. She looks like royalty in her thrice-cursed "costume" and he looks like a clown at his very first rodeo, and she's still got the nerve to be sour over it. 

"You clean up well," she says when she's drawn all the way near. The mockery doesn't just color her voice, it seeps into every line of her body as she maintains effortless poise, her ease so complete that Slick just wants to hit her. His knuckles would never even make it to her face. 

"You look like someone finally managed to bury you, only to be treated to the horror of their bad seed blossoming into some hellish flower," he shoots back.

She grins, bright and deadly. 

"Thank you," she says. "I never realized you were a man of such poetry." 

Slick barely restrains himself from hocking up and spitting on the edge of her dress. When she sees the constipated look on his face, she only laughs. On the periphery, Slick is aware of all the other carapacians finally filtering into the room, but the increasing press of the growing crowd is no longer something he can concern himself with. 

He isn't one for dismissing potential threats that way, but he's already got his eye on the most deadly woman in the room. 

"Get me a drink," she says, loftily, so it isn't a question. 

"Get your own damn drink," he snaps back. 

Her dress doesn't even have sleeves, has nowhere good to hide a weapon with all that frippery and fluff save for stuffed right up inside the layers of petticoats and tulle (and she could smuggle a Gatling gun with no one the wiser so it's not entirely a loss), but her arms move just so and Slick is instantly on the defensive. His hand moves to free his dagger from its sheath, only to feel nothing there, and to remember that Deuce confiscated all of those things off each of them because it wasn't in the spirit of a party. 

It won't be in the spirit of a party for Snowman to stab him in the neck, either, but he highly doubts that sort of consideration ever stopped her. 

"My drink?" she says, when he remains frozen.

Slick turns on his heel without another word and stalks off to the refreshments table and the bowl of punch. He'd meant to spike it, but he pours her a nice, virgin glass, and pulls out his flask to suck down several long swallows of brandy just for himself. 

It's bound to be a long night, and like hell he'll be completing it sober. 

-

-


End file.
